Are the obstacles to enlightenment the same for a man as for a
woman?
Yes, but the emphasis is different. Generally speaking, it is easier for
a woman to feel and be in her body, so she is naturally closer to Being
and potentially closer to enlightenment than a man. This is why many
ancient cultures instinctively chose female figures or analogies to
represent or describe the formless and transcendental reality. It was
often seen as a womb that gives birth to everything in creation and
sustains and nourishes it during its life as form. In the Tao Te Ching ,
one of the most ancient and profound books ever written, the Tao,
which could be translated as Being, is described as “infinite, eternally
present, the mother of the universe.” Naturally, women are closer to it
than men since they virtually “embody” the Unmanifested. What is
more, all creatures and all things must eventually return to the
Source. “All things vanish into the Tao. It alone endures.” Since the
Source is seen as female, this is represented as the light and dark
sides of the archetypal feminine in psychology and mythology. The
Goddess or Divine Mother has two aspects: She gives life, and she
takes life.
When the mind took over and humans lost touch with the reality of
their divine essence, they started to think of God as a male figure.
Society became male-dominated, and the female was made
subordinate to the male.
I am not suggesting a return to earlier female representations of the
divine. Some people now use the term Goddess instead of God. They
are redressing a balance between male and female that was lost a
long time ago, and that is good. But it is still a representation and a
concept, perhaps temporarily useful, just as a map or a signpost is
temporarily useful, but more a hindrance than a help when you are
ready to realize the reality beyond all concepts and images. What
does remain true, however, is that the energy frequency of the mind
appears to be essentially male. The mind resists, fights for control,
uses, manipulates, attacks, tries to grasp and possess, and so on. This
is why the traditional God is a patriarchal, controlling authority figure,
an often angry man who you should live in fear of, as the Old
Testament suggests. This God is a projection of the human mind.
To go beyond the mind and reconnect with the deeper reality of
Being, very different qualities are needed: surrender, non-judgment,
an openness that allows life to be instead of resisting it, the capacity
to hold all things in the loving embrace of your knowing. All these
qualities are much more closely related to the female principle.
Whereas mind-energy is hard and rigid, Being-energy is soft and
yielding and yet infinitely more powerful than mind. The mind runs
our civilization, whereas Being is in charge of all life on our planet and
beyond. Being is the very Intelligence whose visible manifestation is
the physical universe. Although women are potentially closer to it,
men can also access it within themselves.
At this time, the vast majority of men as well as women are still in the
grip of the mind: identified with the thinker and the pain-body. This,
of course, is what prevents enlightenment and the flowering of love.
As a general rule, the major obstacle for men tends to be the thinking
mind, and the major obstacle for women the pain-body, although in
certain individual cases the opposite may be true, and in others the
two factors may be equal.